The orchestra transitioned seamlessly into the next movement.

Nobody in the ballroom seemed aware that half the room had quietly stopped dancing to watch Lucien Valerius hold a hunter against his chest like something dangerously close to affection.

Seraphina noticed, though.

She noticed everything.

The sideways glances.

The tension hiding beneath elegant smiles.

The subtle way conversations lowered whenever Lucien guided her past another cluster of vampire nobility.

Politics inside predator societies apparently looked exactly like politics everywhere else.

Expensive clothing and concealed murder.

“You’re enjoying this,” she murmured.

Lucien’s hand remained steady against the small of her back as they moved slowly beneath the chandeliers.

“I’m enjoying how uncomfortable they are.”

“That’s deeply unhealthy.”

“It’s one of my better qualities.”

The music carried them through another turn across polished marble floors. Somewhere overhead, candlelight flickered gold against painted ceilings while masked nobles watched from the upper balconies like bored aristocrats observing theater.

The vampire in the gray suit still stood near the eastern terrace.

Church operative.

Watching them too carefully.

Seraphina kept him in peripheral view while pretending to focus on the dance.

“You know his name?” she asked quietly.

Lucien glanced toward the balcony without moving his head.

“Matthias Rainer.”

“Hunting division?”

“Formerly.”

That phrasing sharpened her attention.

“What does ‘formerly’ mean?”

Lucien’s expression remained unreadable.

“It means the Church stopped paying him directly.”

A hired blade, then.

Not official Order.

Worse.

Freelancers were unpredictable.

The orchestra swelled louder as dancers shifted around them in elegant circles.

Lucien’s thumb moved once absently against the fabric at her back before stilling again.

The gesture felt unconscious.

That somehow unsettled her more.

“You keep tracking exits,” he observed.

“You keep tracking everyone who looks at me too long.”

“That’s because some of them are considering whether killing you would impress the room.”

Seraphina glanced toward a group of younger vampires gathered near the champagne tables.

One of them immediately looked away.

Coward.

“You say that strangely casually.”

Lucien lowered his voice slightly.

“You get used to being around predators after a few centuries.”

Before she could answer, movement on the eastern balcony shifted abruptly.

Matthias Rainer disappeared from view.

Every instinct in Seraphina’s body tightened instantly.

“He moved.”

“I know.”

Lucien’s hand left her back.

Subtle.

Fast.

One second warm orchestra light surrounded them.

The next, the atmosphere changed.

Not visibly.

Instinctively.

Like a room noticing danger before understanding it.

Seraphina’s fingers brushed automatically toward the hidden dagger strapped against her thigh.

Lucien noticed.

“Don’t draw yet.”

“That depends what he’s doing.”

“He’s positioning.”

“For what?”

Lucien’s gaze lifted briefly toward the upper balconies.

Then sharpened.

“Down.”

Seraphina moved before understanding why.

Years of training overrode thought.

She dropped hard just as glass exploded above them.

The shot cracked through the ballroom loud enough to silence the orchestra instantly.

Screaming followed half a second later.

Guests scattered across the marble floor while another bullet shattered the chandelier overhead.

Crystal rained downward.

Lucien grabbed Seraphina by the wrist and pulled her behind one of the massive stone columns just as a third shot tore through the space where her head had been.

The assassin wasn’t aiming at Lucien.

He was aiming at her.

“What the hell—”

“Church rounds,” Lucien interrupted sharply.

Another shot slammed into the pillar beside them, silver fragments spraying across marble.

Seraphina risked one glance toward the upper balcony.

Matthias stood near the terrace archway holding a long silver-barreled rifle already repositioning for another shot.

Around him, guests screamed and shoved toward exits.

Nobody moved toward the shooter.

Interesting.

Either they were afraid—

or they knew exactly who hired him.

Lucien looked furious now.

Not dramatic rage.

Focused rage.

The dangerous kind.

“You brought me to a political assassination attempt,” Seraphina snapped.

“I assumed they’d wait until dessert.”

“That’s not funny.”

“It wasn’t intended to be.”

Another shot cracked across the ballroom.

This one close enough that Seraphina felt the heat of it pass beside her face.

Lucien’s expression changed instantly after that.

Something colder settled behind his eyes.

Predatory.

Ancient.

The ballroom lights flickered once.

Then again.

Several nearby vampires visibly backed away from him.

Fear spreading quietly through the room.

“Stay here,” he said.

Seraphina stared at him like he’d lost his mind.

“He’s using silver ammunition.”

“Yes.”

“You can’t just walk toward him.”

Lucien adjusted one glove slowly.

“I can if I’m irritated enough.”

Before she could stop him, he stepped out from behind the pillar.

The assassin fired immediately.

The silver round crossed the ballroom in less than a second.

Lucien moved before impact.

Not fast in the human sense.

Wrong fast.

Like reality briefly failed to keep up with him.

The bullet shattered harmlessly against marble columns behind where he’d been standing moments earlier.

Gasps rippled through the ballroom.

Matthias fired again.

And again.

Lucien kept walking.

Not rushing.

Walking.

Calmly enough that the assassin’s composure visibly started breaking apart.

By the fourth missed shot, panic had entered the man’s movements.

Seraphina realized something then.

Lucien wasn’t simply avoiding the bullets.

He was terrifying him.

Deliberately.

The assassin backed toward the balcony doors while reloading frantically.

Silver cartridges hit marble floor one after another beneath shaking hands.

“Stay back!” Matthias shouted.

Lucien kept approaching.

The ballroom had gone almost completely silent now except for distant screaming from the lower corridors.

Even the vampires looked unsettled.

Because whatever Lucien was in this moment—

it clearly frightened them too.

Matthias fired again.

Lucien caught the rifle barrel mid-shot.

The sound of twisting metal echoed sharply across the ballroom.

The assassin cried out as Lucien ripped the weapon completely from his hands and threw it aside hard enough to smash through a nearby statue.

Then Lucien grabbed him.

Not elegantly.

Not theatrically.

One hand closing around the front of Matthias’s throat hard enough to lift him partially off the floor.

The assassin struggled instantly.

Silver knife out.

Desperate.

He slashed toward Lucien’s ribs.

Lucien ignored it.

The blade connected.

Black fabric split.

No reaction.

His attention remained fixed entirely on the assassin’s face.

“Who sent you?” Lucien asked quietly.

Matthias laughed breathlessly despite the crushing grip around his throat.

“You think it matters?”

Lucien’s eyes darkened slightly.

“Usually, yes.”

“You’re too late,” Matthias rasped. “The gate’s already—”

His sentence ended abruptly.

Not because Lucien interrupted.

Because the assassin’s body suddenly convulsed violently.

Seraphina moved instantly.

“Wait—”

Too late.

Black veins erupted beneath Matthias’s skin.

The same veins.

Same infection.

Same thing they’d seen in the ferals.

His jaw snapped unnaturally sideways as blood poured suddenly from his mouth.

Lucien released him immediately.

The assassin collapsed hard onto the ballroom floor twitching violently.

Several vampires backed away in visible disgust.

Seraphina dropped beside the body.

“No, no— stay with me.”

Matthias grabbed her wrist with terrifying strength.

His cloudy eyes rolled toward her face.

And for one horrible second—

he looked afraid.

Not murderous.

Afraid.

“They opened it,” he whispered.

Then his spine arched sharply enough to crack.

The body went still.

Silence settled across the ruined ballroom.

Somewhere nearby, shattered crystal still rolled slowly across marble floor.

Seraphina remained crouched beside the corpse, pulse hammering hard enough to hurt.

The veins.

Again.

The Church assassin had been infected too.

Which meant this wasn’t random anymore.

This was organized.

Behind her, Lucien stood unnaturally motionless.

One hand still bloodstained from crushing the rifle barehanded.

The ballroom guests watched him carefully now.

No one spoke.

No one moved too close.

Even terrified, the vampires understood instinctively that something had shifted tonight.

Lucien finally looked toward Seraphina.

Not at the corpse.

At her.

Checking.

Making sure she was alive.

The realization arrived before she could stop it.

And somehow—

that disturbed her more than the violence had.